Natalie Marino’s long wait for a swine flu shot is over.
The 48-year-old USAA employee takes immune system-suppressing medicines for a chronic medical condition, putting her squarely in one of the high-risk priority groups for the vaccine.
“I’ve been waiting,” she said after getting the shot Thursday. After calling area pharmacies and clinics for weeks, she heard from her mother that Texas MedClinics was offering a few hundred doses to the public at two of its nine San Antonio locations — 7460 Interstate 35 North and 9885 Interstate 10 West — on a first-come, first-served basis.
Others will have to wait a little longer. As of this week, the Texas Department of State Health Services reports that 174,554 doses of swine flu vaccine are in Bexar County or in the process of being shipped. That’s enough for roughly 11 percent of the total population, about the same as in other large Texas counties.
But because so little vaccine is available, state health officials have chosen to send most of the 3.2 million doses they’ve received to doctors who care for an even smaller high-risk group than originally planned: healthy children 6 months to 4 years of age, those 5-18 with chronic health problems, those who care for children younger than 6 months, pregnant women and health care workers.
Still, small amounts are making their way to those who treat the others on the larger priority list: healthy young people ages 5 to 24, and those 25 to 64 with chronic health problems.
Trying to find the vaccine is another matter. Even local health officials aren’t sure how many doses have gone to which providers.
Dr. David Gude, chief operating officer of Texas MedClinics, said the vaccine has been trickling in for a couple of weeks.
“But it’s been such small numbers that we really haven’t wanted to cause a big stir and say we have this, because we’d be out in 15 or 20 minutes. So we waited until we had a small stockpile,” he said.
Also Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its most complete estimates to date on the pandemic, and urged diabetics in particular to take the infection seriously.
Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, told reporters in a conference call that an estimated 22 million Americans have caught swine flu since it appeared in April. Of those, 98,000 were hospitalized and 3,900 have died.
Children have been hardest hit, with 18.8 million sick, 36,000 hospitalized and 540 dead.
While people with several types of chronic illnesses are advised to get the swine flu shot, the new estimates show that diabetics are at particular risk. About one in five adults who were hospitalized with swine flu had diabetes, and a quarter of those ended up in an intensive care unit.
“This can be a very severe illness for people with diabetes,” Schuchat said.
About 670 local health providers have registered to get the vaccine. The Metropolitan Health District so far has been allotted another 16,400 doses. Officials hope next to vaccinate paramedics and other emergency workers. Plans for holding large public clinics at schools and other locations have been postponed until more vaccine arrives.
Website: www.mysanantonio.com/health/Swine_flu_vaccine_starts_trickling_in_at_clinics.html